The invention relates to communications and more particularly to scheduling of packet flow in packet-based networks.
Data are transferred over packet-based networks in packets and sequences of packets. These packets and sequences of packets are grouped as flows (queues; “queues” and “flows” are used interchangeably below). These queues have associated traffic characteristics (e.g., source, destination, and protocol) related to their transfer through a network. According to the traffic characteristics, resources can be allocated to the queues to help to use available resources efficiently and transfer data in a timely manner. An exemplary flow is a sequence of packets carrying File Transfer Protocol (FTP) data traffic from an originating computer to a destination computer across a network, e.g., a packet-based network 24 (FIG. 1). Another exemplary flow is a sequence of packets carrying real time voice traffic from an originating device to a destination device across a packet network, e.g., the network 24 (FIG. 1).
More resources, and/or better use of resources, for transferring data through packet-based networks are needed as more people use packet-based networks, such as the Internet, to transmit increasing amounts of data with different traffic characteristics. Packet-based networks are increasingly popular and are used to communicate more data every day. For example, the Internet is a packet-based network accessed by millions every day, e.g., to view world-wide-web pages and to send and receive email. Email already outnumbers traditional mail by approximately 10 to 1, and this ratio is expected to increase. As more data are transferred and technology progresses, people expect packet-based networks to handle the increased data traffic, to transmit the data faster, and to handle different types of services such as Voice Over Internet Protocol (VoIP) or IP telephony.